Journal of Engineering Education Transformations, Special Issue, eISSN 2394-1707
A Novel Method for Attainment Measurement of
CO’s and PO’s for Tier-II Institutions
Mr. Kiran B. Malagi1,Mr. Kumar Swamy V. 2,Dr.B.S.Anami
1 Asst Professor, Department of CSE, KLEIT, Hubballi,
2 Asst Professor, Department of EEE, KLEIT, Hubballi,
3 Principal, KLEIT, Hubballi,
1malagikiran@gmail.com
2 swamy_bvbdigital@yahoo.co.in
3
anami_basu@hotmail.com
Abstract: National Board of accreditation accredits
various programs of technical institution in India. It is a
quality assurance process that determines whether the
educational objectives set by the institutes are being
continually and honestly perceived or not. In this process,
a graduate is expected to have certain qualities, during and
after the completion of his/her graduation and are called
Program Outcomes (PO) and are also referred to as
Graduate Attributes. In this paper, we have proposed a
novel method for measurement of attainment of CO’s and
PO’s for Tier-II institutions. The measurement of
attainment of COs and POs is illustrated for a course in
Electrical and electronics engineering program. The
proposed method helps in preparing effective lesson plan,
drawing quality question paper.
Keywords: Measurement, Attainment, Course Outcomes,
Program Outcomes, Graduate Attributes.
Mr. Kiran B. Malagi1
1 Asst Professor, Department of CSE, KLEIT, Hubballi,
1malagikiran@gmail.com
3
1. Introduction:
It is often reported that, there is tremendous growth in
education providers, the need for quality assurance
becomes essential. There is a gap between industry and
academia, because there is lack of role-ready engineers
required by the industry. So the traditional method of
education system itself needs to be changed. A drift is
required from teacher centric to student centric education
system. In teacher centric education system, a teacher
defines the content that they intend to teach, the approach
used for content delivery and content assessment. The
focus is on what student is expected to be able to do to
pass a module or a program. In student centric education
system, the focus is laid on what the students are expected
to be able to demonstrate at the end of a module or
program or we can say after the learning period.
In order to meet these challenges in India, UGC formed
National Assessment and Accreditation Council (NAAC),
and carries out Institute level Accreditation and All India
Council for Technical Education (AICTE) set a committee
called National Board of Accreditation (NBA), which
accredits the Technological Programs. All the Technical
educational institutions apply for NBA to avail fiscal
benefits. In this regard, every institute has to set vision,
mission, and Program educational objectives, Program
Outcomes (PO), Course Outcomes (CO) and Topic
Learning Outcomes (TO). These parameters need to be
assessed by the institute at regular intervals, namely, Topic
learning outcomes after the topic completion, Course
learning outcomes at the time of internal assessments and
Semester examination, Program outcomes are assessed at
the time of completion of graduation. PEO are assessed
based on the performance of the graduates in the society,
playing different roles. At the basic level, we need to set
the COs in order to educate, what a student will be able to
do after completion of the course. These COs are
contributing in attainment of POs. In this paper, we are
concentrating on how to assess the attainment of COs and
POs (in tern Graduate attributes). We have Performance
Indicator Codes in short called as PI codes, which indicate
the program outcome in general and Outcome element in
specific being focused by that particular CO. In order to
know the state-of-the-art in attainment measurements in particular IA is obtained. At the end of the semester
outcome based education, we have carried out a literature consolidating the average of all IA, Attainment level is
Sl Parameters Approach
Authors Assessment Remarks
no assessed used
1 Izham et al. Course Outcomes Quantitative  Final exam % of weightage has been assigned
(CO)  Quiz
 Assignment
 Projects
2 Savita S et al. Program Outcome Quantitative  Review literature % of weightage has been assigned
(PO)  Design process
 Tabulation & Result
3 Osman et al. CO Qualitative  Final exam Considered for only 1 lab course
 Projects
4 Masni et al CO and PO Quantitative A = n/N*100% Considered for only the avg marks
Where and final formula has been given.
A = CO/PO attainment,
n = total students achieve
above 50%
N = total students
5 Yuzainee et al. PO Quantitative Mean and standard Considered for both Lab and
deviation theory course

6 Makinda et al. CO and PO Quantitative Average marks Considered only One question
mapping to one individual CO for
final attainment
8 Zulfadli et al. CO Quantitative  Final exam No discussion about overall CO
 Quiz attainment over the class
 Assignment
9 Sam Chu et al. CO and PO Qualitative NA Grading system at the beginning
and at the End of sem/year
10 Kiran et al CO Quantitative Internal assessment Attainment of COs and POs from
(Proposed micro level considering each bit of
methodology) the question in the IA question
paper.
survey. obtained.

From Table 1, we have found that, the work done till now The paper is organized into four sections. Section 2
in this area of assessing the attainment of COs and POs is deals with proposed methodology. Results and discussions
done only for the autonomous institutions, where the are given in section 3 and conclusion is given in section 4.
liberty of setting curriculum, syllabus, content delivery and
also setting evaluation strategy is with the autonomous
institute itself, whereas the proposed work addresses this
issue from the affiliated institute’s perspective. As an 2. Proposed Methodology:
affiliated institute, care is taken only in lesson delivery and
In Fig 1 Teaching Learning Process cycle is
assessing the attainment of COs and POs by internal
shown. This consists of three phases, namely, Planning
assessments. Evaluation of answer scripts (Final
Phase, Action Phase and lastly the Measure and Analysis
examination) is done at the university level. This work
phase. The first one being the Planning phase the course
assesses the attainment of COs and POs in micro level
Outcome and Objectives are set and the curriculum is
considering each bit of the question in the Internal
designed. Also the method of assessment and schedule of
Assessment (IA) question paper and every internal
assessment is done.
assessment of all the course offered in that semester. Also
PO attainment from that
Table 1: Literature survey. *Course Outcomes (CO), Program Outcome (PO), NA- Not Available
Journal of Engineering Education Transformations, Special Issue, eISSN 2394-1707
Fig 1: Teaching- Learning Process Cycle
The second phase is an Action phase, where content
delivered the question paper for assessment is drawn and
internal assessments are conducted and evaluation is done.
In the third phase, Measure and Analysis phase,
based on the marks obtained by the students we need to
measure the COs and POs attainment, analyze and take
appropriate actions so that there is a continuous
improvement. There are two methods for measurement of
attainment of outcomes, one is the direct method and
another is an indirect method of assessment. The method
proposed pertains to the direct method, where analysis
done is based on the Marks obtained by students across the
whole class for that course. In this regard we are proposing
some practices followed in each phase.
2.1 Planning phase:
This phase consists of measurement of course
outcomes and preparation of lesson plans.
2.1.1 Course Outcomes:
Course outcomes can be drawn by combining few
topics learning outcome (TLOs). It is advised to have 5-6
COs per course in a program. COs should be drawn in
such a way that they should be generic enough to state the
outcomes rather than speaking very much specific about
the syllabi set by the BOS/University. Also when we are
setting the question paper for individual internal
assessment, the question paper should address maximum
COs. Over a semester the entire COs should be assessed
for each and every student in that course.
As an affiliated institution (Tier II), we do not
frame curriculum and syllabi, we focus upon setting up the
Course outcomes to meet the graduate attributes. Over a
program we should be able to address all the POs. We
can’t expect an individual course will meet all POs. With
this in mind whenever an IA is conducted average of
student marks for an individual bit of the question is taken
and hence we say that average is the total CO attainment
by that question by the class. Similarly other bits of
questions and their CO attainment are calculated. All
questions with the same CO are added and then average of
these gives the total attainment of the CO through the
question paper.
2.1.2 Lesson plans:
In the lesson plans the COs, CO-PO Mapping, TLOs
(Topic Learning Outcomes), hour wise distribution of
contents are included. Also Unit wise review questions and
their respective TLO, Blooms level and PI codes are all
mentioned. This help the student to be aware about all
these parameters of OBE .Students will be familiar with
the kind of questions appearing, the content to be written
to get full marks for that question, time management in
exam etc. As CO, PO( PI Codes ) and also Blooms levels
are the measures to say a question paper as a quality
question paper, we include the above said parameters in
lesson plans and distribute it to students every semester
with all courses for that semester at the start of semester.
2.2 Quality of Question paper:
Question paper must consist of questions which can
be answered in stipulated time period with various levels
of learning (BLOOMS levels). It is hard to expect a
student answer 3-4, L3 level questions in 1 hour. Template
of a question paper is shown below where Questions, their
respective CO, Marks allotted, Blooms level and PI code
are mentioned. Table 2 fives a Question paper format of
signals and systems course for EEE program.
Table 2: A Model question paper
2.1.3 Performance Indicator Codes:
Every program has to set its Performance Indicators by
considering the areas upon which their syllabi is spread
over according to the Graduate attributes specified by
NBA. The twelve graduates attributes which are also
referred to as Program outcomes are listed in Table 3.
Table 3. List of Program Outcomes (Graduate Attributes)
1. Engineering knowledge:
2. Problem analysis:
3. Design/development of
solutions:
4. Conduct investigations
of complex problems:
5. Modern tool usage:
6. The engineer and
society:
correlate the concepts delivered to the contents in the
lesson plan and question paper pattern and set the question
7. Environment and paper to the standards specified to conduct examinations.
sustainability:
8. Ethics: 2.3 Attainment of CO
9. Individual and team After evaluation of IA booklets average marks of
work: each bit is tabulated, and % of CO attainment is calculated
10. Communication: with the formula,
11. Project management % of CO attainment from one question = (100 * AVG
and finance: marks of the class for that bit of Question) / marks
12. Life-long learning: allotted for that bit of question.
…………..……………………………………… (1)

A program means it should include respective first year
courses also. With one example we try to explain the
process of evolving with PI code chart. Considering
Engineering Knowledge, the first Program outcome, we
consider three outcome elements in it - Ability to apply
knowledge of 1) Mathematics, 2) Science and 3)
Technology. Then in mathematics we explore the
mathematical elements, which contribute to our study in
the program and identify them as indicators. Table 4gives
of an example of Computer science and engineering
program where the term CSPO represents – Computer
science Program Outcome. CSOE represent Computer
science Outcome Element.
Then Average of percentage of individual COs is
taken across whole question paper which can be calculated
as given in equation-1. For this, we see the questions with
same CO and take average marks, add them and divide it
by number of questions with same CO. For example,
consider x as the CO number.
% attainment of CO.x = Sum of % of CO.x
attainment* / Number of Questions with CO.x.
...................……………………………………… (2)
* considering all questions with same CO.

2.4 Attainment of PO
Table 4: Performance indicator chart for one PO with few Based on the CO attainment level we do measure PO
outcome elements attainment. We consider CO-PO mapping as the first step
CSPO (1): Engineering knowledge and mention to what extent a CO is contributing to a PO -
CSOE (a) Ability to apply the knowledge of either LOW (1), Medium (2) or High (3). By taking the
Mathematics sum of values in a row (containing a CO and find out the
Performance Indicator percentage of contribution for POs by that CO. As an
1 Ability to apply knowledge of algebra. example consider Table. No 5 where CO 1 is contributing
Medium to PO2 , High to PO4 and Low to PO6.
CSOE (b) Ability to apply the knowledge of science
Table 5: A single CO- PO mapping
Performance Indicator
1 Ability to apply the knowledge of basic CO\PO 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
science. 1 2 3 1
2 Ability to apply the knowledge of basic
computer science. Now
CSOE (c) Ability to apply the knowledge of
Engineering % contribution of CO1 to PO2 = (100 * 2) / Sum of
Performance Indicator Contribution levels (= 6) ≈ 34
Apply the knowledge of System % contribution of CO1 to PO4 = (100 * 3) / Sum of
1 Contribution levels (= 6)= 50
engineering
% contribution of CO1 to PO6 = (100 * 1) / Sum of
Structure of a typical performance indicator is as given Contribution levels (= 6) ≈ 16
under:
CSPO number – CSOE code - Performance Therefore % of Contribution of CO1 to relevant
Indicator number PO is 34+50+16 = 100%. Similarly consider all CO-PO
Ex. 1a2 mapping and obtain the average expected PO attainment.
i.e., Engineering Knowledge – Ability to apply knowledge This will be the expected PO attainment by that course.
of Mathematics- Ability to apply knowledge of Algebra. This value is used in expected PO attainment in Criteria
No 7 “Continuous Improvement” of SAR Tier-II. This is
2.2 Action Phase: obtained by the following rule
Once the planning phase completed, accordingly the
faculty has to act by delivering the course contents,
Journal of Engineering Education Transformations, Special Issue, eISSN 2394-1707
Percentage distribution of CO over all
Contributi on of CO to individual PO *100
 Extent of Contribution of CO to all POs
…….. (3)
Now the calculation of Actual PO attainment has
to be done. The formula used is:
Attainment of POs by individual CO = (Avg of Class
CO Attainment * Expected PO attainment) / 100
……………………….…………………………….. (4)
This gives the attainment of POs that are mapped to
one individual CO. In the same fashion All CO and PO
attainments are calculated. Then the POs attainment is
added and average is taken. That is the total attainment of
POs from that particular internal assessment.
These calculations result into attainment from only
one IA for only one particular course. The same procedure
has to be followed for all the IAs and all the courses in that
semester and average of these becomes the attainment
from the courses in that semester. The Procedure is
continued for one batch of students and consolidated
report needs to be generated where cumulative attainment
shall be changing based on the performance of the students
in that semester.
3. Results and Discussions:
Attainment of CO and PO is measured considering the
Topic learning outcomes also. So attainment that is being
spoken here is the guaranteed minimum attainment. An
excel sheet with all the necessary formulae for measuring
attainment is prepared. The faculty after completion of
evaluation of IA booklets in his course, has to enter the
marks in excel sheet. Also he has to enter the CO to which
the question meets, the maximum marks for that bit of
question, and CO-PO mapping done in lesson plan. All
other calculation for one IA is done with the formulae
proposed.
Figure 2: Snap shot of Excel Sheet for marks entry and CO attainment for
S&S course of EEE Program.
POs= The Figure 2 is a snapshot showing Course outcome
attainment and Figure 3 is Program outcome attainment. In
Figure 2 the rows represent performance by a student and
his average by taking best of two marks out of three and
column represents the performance of the all students
across a class in that bit of question. With the data
available Average of each bit is obtained and then the
percentage of CO attainment is calculated. Faculty enters
the Blooms level for which a graph is drawn
demonstrating the level of question paper. Then Average
CO attainment is obtained for all COs across all questions.
In the question paper considered here CO1 and CO2
are measured and attainment level is 80.97 and 90.87
respectively. Hence this is a substantial attainment. We
have a measure that if CO attainment is from 0 – 35 %, it’s
a poor attainment and hence the topic has to be
readdressed to the class. If the range is in between 36-60 it
is moderate attainment. Then in tutorial classed the topic
needs to be discussed. If the attainment range is from 61 to
100 this is a substantial attainment.
Now for measuring PO attainment, we have taken the
table where CO-PO mapping table is prepared in the
lesson plans. Consider the Figure 2, in which we are
showing the CO-PO mapping, the expected PO attainment
and the actual PO attainment from that particular IA.
In the Figure 3, for one CO we have three Rows.
The first row corresponds to the contribution of CO to an
individual PO. Second row represents the expected PO
attainment and the third actual PO attained.
Figure 3: Snap Shot of Excel Sheet for PO attainment.
As the contribution of CO1 is only to PO1 100% is
the expected attainment. From the IA analysis we have
achieved 89.97. CO2 is contributing low to first 3 POs,
hence 33.33% is the contribution of CO2 for PO1, PO2
and PO3 and is the expected attainment from that CO2
also. Actual attainment is 30.28 in each PO. This is the
result that we have obtained. By considering the
consolidated result over a semester, CO and PO attainment
over a course are measured.
4. CONCLUSIONS:
NBA has become mandatory for engineering colleges
both autonomous and affiliated. The proposed method of
attainment measurement is developed for tier-II
institutions which are affiliated to a university. The
method has considered TLOs, CO’s, assignment of
performance indicators for measuring attainment of each
CO and PO. This quantitative assessment is unlike
prevailing qualitative approaches in assessing a program.
The method also depicts how the TLOs, COs and POs are
interdependent. The work is useful in preparing effective
lesson plans, and drawing quality question papers. Another
intangible benefit is that one feels confident in giving the
details for criteria-2 and criteria-3 of Self Assessment
Report of NBA document for TIER II institutions. The
method is illustrated with “Signals and Systems” course of
BE program in Electrical and Electronics engineering
program. However the proposed method of measurement
is useful across the different programs, namely, medicine,
agriculture and management etc.
Acknowledgement:
Authors wish to thank to all t he faculty members
of K.L.E. Institute of Technology, Hubli and K.L.E.
Technological University, Hubli, whose suggestions
helped us to propose this novel approach .
References
1. .Makinda J.,Bolong N., Mirasa A.K and Ayog J.L.,
“Assessing the Achievement of Program Outcome on
Environment and Sustainability: A Case Study in
Engineering Education” 2nd Regional conference on
Campus sustainability: Capacity building in
Enhancing Campus sustainability. University
Malaysia Sabah, Malaysia, 7th-8th April 2015.
2. Izham Zainal Abidin, Adzly Anua and Norshah
Hafeez Shuaib,” Assessing the attainment of course
outcomes (CO) for an engineering course”
Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference of
Teaching and Learning INTI University College,
Malaysia (ICTL 2009)
3. Norain Farhana Ahmad Fuaad, Ruhizan Bt.
Mohammad Yasin and Norngainy MohdTawil,
“Achievement of the Program Outcomes in Outcomes
Based Education Implementation - A Meta Analysis” ,
Proceedings of the 2014 International Conference on
Industrial Engineering and Operations Management
Bali, Indonesia, January 7 – 9, 2014.
4. Zulfadli, Shamsul Anuar Mokhtar , Sayani Puteh, Siti
Mashitah Shamsul Anuar ,” OBE Measurement
System in Malaysian Institute of Information
Technology Universiti Kuala Lumpur” 2014 Fifth
International Conference on Intelligent Systems,
Modelling and Simulation, pp 12-19.2014.
5. Sam Chu, Natalie Fong, Si Ying Tan,” Applying
outcomes-based teaching and learning framework in
the BSc Information Management Program in the
Faculty of Education”, Intl conf on enhancing
Learning Experiences in Higher Education, Hong
Kong., 2-3, December 2010.
6. S.A.Osman, A. Mutalib, M.A.Khoiry, “Measuring
Students’ Achievement in Fundamental Course of
Civil and Structural Engineering Degree Programme”
Latest advances in educational technologies,
ISBN:978-1-61804-093-0.
7. M.S. Jaafar, N. K. Nordin, R. Wagiran, A. Aziz,
M.J.M.M. Noor, M.R. Osman, J. Noorzaei and
F.N.A. Abdulaziz, “ Assessment Strategy for an
Outcome Based Education” , Universiti Putra
Malaysia, 43400 UPM-Serdang, Malaysia
8. Masni-Azian, A. Rahimah, A.H. and M.S., Othman,
“Towards OBE: A Case Study of Course Outcome
(CO) and Programme Outcome (PO) Attainment for
Product Design and Development Course” OSR
Journal of Research & Method in Education (IOSR-
JRME) e-ISSN: 2320–7388, p-ISSN: 2320-737X.
Volume 4, Issue 2 Ver. III (Mar-Apr. 2014), PP 55-61.
9. Suresh D. Mane, “Accreditation of UG Engineering
Programmes in India: Enhanced Role of Teaching
Fraternity”, International Journal of Scientific
Engineering and Applied Science (IJSEAS) - Volume-
1, Issue-6, September 2015.
10. Zamri Mohamed, Mohd Yusof Taib, M.S. Reza,
“Assessment Method for Course Outcome and
Program Outcome In Outcome Based Education
(OBE)”, Proceedings of MUCET2010 Malaysian
Technical Universities Conference on Engineering
and Technology, June 28-29, 2010.
11. Norshah hafeez shuaib,Adzly anuar, Ramesh singh
and Mohd zamri yusoff, “Implementing continual
quality improvement (CQI) process in an outcome-
based education (OBE) approach”, Proceedings of the
2nd International Conference of Teaching and
Learning, 2009.
12. H. R. Bhagyalakshmi D., Seshachalam, S. Lalitha,
“Program Outcome Attainment Through Course
Outcomes: A Comprehensive Approach”, Proc of the
Intl Conference on Transformations in Engineering
Education, pp 279-287, 2014.
13. Ramchandra, S., Maitra, S, MallikarjunaBabu,
K.”Method for estimation of attainment of program
outcome through course outcome for outcome based
education”, 2014 IEEE International Conference on
MOOC, Innovation and Technology in Education
(MITE),pp 7 – 12, 2014.
14. www. nbaind. org
15. Sandra Staklis, Steven Klein, "Technical Skill
Attainment and Post-Program Outcomes: An Analysis
of Pennsylvania Secondary Career and Technical
Education Graduates Technical ", National Research
Center for Career and Technical Education University
of Louisville.
16. H. Basril, A. B. Che Man, W. H. Wan Badaruzzaman
& M. J. M. Nor, "Malaysia And The Washington
Accord: What It Takes For Full Membership",
International Journal of Engineering and Technology,
Vol. 1(1), 2004, pp. 64-73.
17. Yildirim, TP, L. Shuman and M. Besterfield-Sacre,
"Model Eliciting Activities: Assessing Engineering
Student Problem Solving and Skill Integration
Journal of Engineering Education Transformations, Special Issue, eISSN 2394-1707

Processes," International Journal of Engineering

Education, 26(4), 2010, pp. 831-845.

About Authors:

Mr. Kiran B. Malagi,

Assistant professor, K. L. E. Institute
of Technology. Hubli, Karnataka,
India. He has obtained B E and
Masters degree in Computer Science
and Engineering , in the year 2005
and 2010 respectively. He worked as
Head of Computer Science
Department, K.L.E. Society’s C.B.
Kolli polytechnic, Haveri from 2005-2010 . From 2010
onwards he is working in K.L.E. Institute of Technology,
Hubli. He has a total of 10 years of experience. His areas
of interest are Data base Management system, Data
Mining, Web mining, Computer Graphics and software
Engineering.

Mr. V. Kumar Swamy is

presently working as Assistant Professor
in Department of Electrical and
Electronics Engineering, K.L.E. Institute
of Technology, Hubli. He completed his
BE (Electrical and Electronics) in 2006
and M.Tech (Digital Electronics) in 2009.
He is pursuing his PhD from VTU, Belgaum. He has total
7 years of experience.

Dr. Basavaraj S. Anami

Principal. K. L. E. Institute Of
Technology. Hubli, Karnataka,
India. He has obtained B E degree
in Electrical Engineering , Masters
degree in Computer Science and
Ph.D in Computer Science in the
year 1981,1986 and 2003
respectively. He worked as faculty
of Computer Science and Engineering Department,
Basaveswar Engineering College , Bagalkot, in various
designations from 1983 to 2008. His research areas of
interest are Image Processing and Pattern Recognition,
Character recognition, Fuzzy systems and Neural
Networks He has published 100 plus research papers in
peer reviewed International Journals and conferences